If you are getting a good IP address and FTP works, you could also try :
telnet www.bbc.co.uk 80 from a shell - this will verify you get get out on port 80 and will also verify DNS. If it can't find an address for the bbc site, the IP is 212.58.224.83.
If that works, try using an alternate proxy in FFox (or fav browser
) as described
here.
HTH